September 6, 2026 • 11 mins
Today’s farmer/politician panel features the Associate Minister of Agriculture and a “renowned Wellington property magnate” who’s also the MP for Northland. Today, we ponder the Q+A rural issues debate, taxes, net zero, the Paris Agreement, KiwiSaver for young farmers, and the Greens wanting to get into the supermarket business.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
But I thought I'd kick it off with, well, a
man I saw on the Q & A rural debate
on yesterday morning, Andrew Hoggart, Associate Minister of Agriculture, of course,
Minister of Biosecurity, and the well-known or renowned Wellington property magnate,
who's also the MP for Northland, Grant McCullum. Now, Grant,
(00:22):
who's telling porkies, you or Tamatha?
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Oh, Tamitha is, mate. Unfortunately for her, I've never owned
a property in Wellington, so therefore it's pretty hard to
rent it out. I do happen to own a property
in Pye here, which saves the taxpayer money because when
I'm in the Mid-North, I stay in my own place
and don't bill you guys for the motel I'm entitled
to stay in. But look, it's just really disappointing that
(00:46):
she just simply didn't apologise to get the facts wrong.
But it says all you need to know about the
Greens and their leadership and their morals and ethics.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
Well, they're going to make food cheaper, Andrew Hoggard. They're
going to get into the supermarket business. And, you know,
they're renowned for their business skills, aren't they? How are
the Greens going to run a supermarket? They couldn't run
a bath.
Speaker 3 (01:04):
Well, I think you just need to go look at
some documentaries from about 1987 Moscow, and that'll give you
a good indication as to how Soviet mart will work,
or the Green supermarket. Long lines for bread, I'm sure, but...
Just absolutely crazy. I mean, you're talking about nationalising a
(01:27):
whole bunch of supermarkets. What's that going to do for
foreign investment? Anyone wanting to come up and set up
shop here in New Zealand, they're going to say, hey,
we get too successful, the government will take our stuff
off us. Let's not bother. So just more dumb, crazy
ideas that completely aren't costed. And so they think that
somehow just taxing 6% of the population is going to
(01:48):
pay for all these dreams. You're sadly mistaken. Everyone's going
to get pinged pretty bloody hard.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
Yesterday morning, I watched the Q & A rural debate
with Jack Tame. Good on him. He got all the
six major players there. And if I was to believe
some of the feedback online, Steve Abel crushed it. He
was the winner.
Speaker 3 (02:10):
Okay, well, whatever.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
What a lot of nonsense. When you listen to that debate,
all I can say is God help New Zealand farming
if the left ever get in. Basically, you had the
Greens who are out to lunch, complete mad policies, wanting
to halve production, at least in this country. And then
you've got Labour with no policies. And then you've got
the top party with no idea and the complete naivety
(02:34):
of what they were saying was well demonstrated. And it
was just really, you know, it showed up. We had,
you know, the coalition government actually understands farming and understands
the importance to our economy.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
Now, I could buy that, Andrew Hoggart, if only you
would play nicely with your coalition partners. You're digging away, you...
Mark Patterson, and who was the other one? Of course,
Todd McClay, the Minister of Agriculture and Trade. And you
should have been working together to fight the evil left.
Speaker 3 (03:05):
No, I don't disagree with that. I don't think I
got stuck into them too much. We had a little
joke with Mark on his trip to India. But no,
when I certainly jumped in and supported Todd with what
he was saying around no need to reduce methane to
zero emissions, Look, there may be the odd jab that
goes back and forth, but by and large we've managed
(03:28):
to work with each other pretty successfully over this term,
like I said in the debate. When I started this term,
farmer confidence was at an all-time low. It's actually doing
pretty good now.
Speaker 1 (03:39):
I thought Jo Luxton was the loser in this debate,
and I've been chewing her ear for months and months
and months. For God's sake, come out with some policy.
It's almost too late now.
Speaker 2 (03:52):
I agree, Jamie.
Speaker 3 (03:53):
Basically, their policy is... Sorry, go ahead, Grant.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
No, no, no. Yeah, I agree, Jamie. I mean, agriculture
is such a major part of our economy, and for
Labour not to have any idea what they're going to do.
And ultimately, though, the real people that will determine the
fate of agricultural policy in our country, in Labour, is
not Joe Laxton. It will be Rachel Brookie and the
environmental thing. Having spent the last... All part of this
(04:19):
year with her on the Environment Select Committee, seeing what
she thinks about farming and environmental rules, all I can
say is beware. That's where you've got to look for
where the real farming policy will be.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
Andrew Hoggard, my takeaway from watching the debate was that,
you know, heaven help farming, the primary sector, small business,
whatever in this country, if we have a centre-left government
of Labour, I'm not even counting Te Pāti Māori, the Greens,
who are probably winning by default almost at the moment,
(04:51):
and Opportunity Party. And I thought Daniel Ebb was left
quite a wee bit short when he didn't even get
his numbers right about the cows.
Speaker 3 (05:00):
No, well, just backing up what Grant said, I mean,
it's not even perhaps Rachel Brookings that's going to set
their policy, because if they're in a coalition and they've
got no policies and the Greens have all the policies
on the left, then it'll be the bloody Greens we
end up with. But Yeah, I mean, all I heard
the other morning was, oh, let's tax our way to prosperity.
And somehow we're going to pay more taxes and, you know,
(05:23):
it's only going to be a small percentage of the
population that'll get harmed. We'll just take off them and
give to you and you'll be fine. That sort of
politics never bloody works. It just drives the productive people
away from this country and eventually everyone will have to
bloody pay.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
Now, are you going to come to some agreement with
the Nats, Andrew Hoggart, about net zero in the Paris Agreement?
A ditto if I probably should have Mark Patterson on
as well talking about it, because there seems to be
a bit of a rift developing there.
Speaker 3 (05:55):
Yeah, look, we haven't said we're going to get out
of it straight away, but what we're saying is things
need to change. And the first thing off the cab
there is a split gas NDC. And it makes, as
I said in the debate, it makes absolutely zero sense
that we have this external target of which is net zero,
(06:16):
but then internally we're saying methane doesn't have to reduce
to zero. That's adding more cost to every New Zealander.
So look, we'll come up to some arrangement in the
coalition negotiations, I'm sure.
Speaker 1 (06:28):
Grant McCullum, are the Nats too woke on this? Not
at all.
Speaker 2 (06:32):
We're just very sensible when it comes to wanting to
actually be able to sell our goods overseas, Jamie, and
into Europe and places like that, where they're like, for example,
land getting record prices. Some of these countries need no
excuse to put up barriers just to help add cost
to our products going into these markets. So we just
have to be smart and do our bit to actually
(06:54):
help fight climate change going forward. Because the goal is 2050,
not next year. So I think we have to put
that all in perspective.
Speaker 1 (07:01):
KiwiSaver... Sorry, Andrew, away you go.
Speaker 3 (07:03):
Yeah, I was just going to say, we shouldn't talk
ourselves out of trying to get decent deals for New Zealand.
And I think the key thing we've got to remember
is none of these countries actually asked for all this
woke stuff to be put in the trade agreements. Actually,
it was New Zealand that said, oh, let's put all
this stuff in the trade agreements. So, quite frankly, I
think we need to test this as to whether or
(07:26):
not the rest of the world actually wants it. You know,
European farms are saying split gas is the way to go, so...
I think we've got a bit of support there for
that approach.
Speaker 1 (07:33):
Well, Grant, it's your fault for putting all the woke
stuff into the FTAs.
Speaker 2 (07:38):
I wouldn't call Tom McClay woke. Let me promise you
that Tom McClay is not woke. We're getting on a KiwiSaver, Jamie.
Speaker 1 (07:47):
KiwiSaver for young farmers. This is good.
Speaker 2 (07:50):
Yes, yes. Now, my good colleague, Suze Redmayne from the Rangitiki,
it was her private member's bill, which has actually been
adopted as a government bill, has now been put on
the order paper, which will allow those people who work
on farms and the houses provided... or the Defence Force,
or the police, and the House provided, to actually use
KiwiSaver to buy their first home, and they don't have
(08:12):
to live in it. It can be in town somewhere,
and they can rent it out, so they can get
on the property ladder. There's been a gap in the
whole system for quite some time, and I really applaud
Sue for being so persistent around this. I look forward
to this eventually getting into Parliament and becoming law.
Speaker 1 (08:29):
Hey, just looking at the text machine, and thank you
for some nice messages welcoming me back. Even Andy Thompson
sent one in. Hey, here's one for you, and I
didn't pick up on this one. Jamie, do you realise
Opportunity Party's land tax won't apply to Maori-owned land? Is
that correct?
Speaker 3 (08:47):
I have no idea. I just looked at the point.
They said it was going to reduce land values by 15%
and realised... Well, that's just dumb enough on its own.
That'll pretty much force up interest rates for everyone because
the banks will suddenly have less value to their loan books,
so they'll be viewed as more riskier by the people
(09:09):
that give them money to loan out. So up go
interest rates. Yeah, I didn't know about that one, but
that's equally as dumb.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
Okay. Hey, just to finish on, it was hoardings. weekend
for all you politicians. I don't know why you bother
because you just put your hoarding up beside the other
bloke and you negate each other anyhow. But Grant, I
see you were out there hammer in hand over the
weekend putting up hoardings as a list MP. Excuse me, team.
(09:38):
Almost got through the show without a cough. As a
list MP, Andrew Hoggart, you probably don't even have to
worry about it.
Speaker 3 (09:46):
No, I was actually out there on Saturday, got my
family in the car, getting some child slave labor to
help me put them up all over the man or two.
Did some more on Sunday and actually just came back
from putting one up in the soaking rain and ashes.
this morning. So yep, still getting out there.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
So are your hoardings, Grant, polluting the fine landscape of Northland?
Speaker 2 (10:08):
There's no such, definitely not polluting it. It's informing people
there's an election coming and who the great party of
National they should be voting for. Give their party vote
to National. That's what it's all about, Jamie. So we
have a strong centre-right coalition government led by National. So
that's what the hoardings are there to say. And so
get out there, people. And please, one promise, please, things,
don't vandalise them. They're a damn lot of work to
(10:30):
stick up. And having to keep fixing them all the
time is a real pain.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
Hey, look, because I've been a bit crook, my hearing's
not as good as what it was. Did you say
led by National or led by Winston?
Speaker 2 (10:41):
Led by National.
Speaker 1 (10:43):
Oh, sorry.
Speaker 3 (10:43):
Smart. Well, the latest polls are likely led by David.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
Excuse me. Rightio, lads. Good to catch up. No worries.
A nice, entertaining light way to kick off the first
day back on the tools. Thanks for your time. All
the best, everyone.
Speaker 3 (11:01):
Yes, bye.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
There we go. Today's panel, Andrew Hoggard, Grant McCullum.
But I thought I'd kick it off with, well, a
man I saw on the Q & A rural debate
on yesterday morning, Andrew Hoggart, Associate Minister of Agriculture, of course,
Minister of Biosecurity, and the well-known or renowned Wellington property magnate,
who's also the MP for Northland, Grant McCullum. Now, Grant,
(00:22):
who's telling porkies, you or Tamatha?
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Oh, Tamitha is, mate. Unfortunately for her, I've never owned
a property in Wellington, so therefore it's pretty hard to
rent it out. I do happen to own a property
in Pye here, which saves the taxpayer money because when
I'm in the Mid-North, I stay in my own place
and don't bill you guys for the motel I'm entitled
to stay in. But look, it's just really disappointing that
(00:46):
she just simply didn't apologise to get the facts wrong.
But it says all you need to know about the
Greens and their leadership and their morals and ethics.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
Well, they're going to make food cheaper, Andrew Hoggard. They're
going to get into the supermarket business. And, you know,
they're renowned for their business skills, aren't they? How are
the Greens going to run a supermarket? They couldn't run
a bath.
Speaker 3 (01:04):
Well, I think you just need to go look at
some documentaries from about 1987 Moscow, and that'll give you
a good indication as to how Soviet mart will work,
or the Green supermarket. Long lines for bread, I'm sure, but...
Just absolutely crazy. I mean, you're talking about nationalising a
(01:27):
whole bunch of supermarkets. What's that going to do for
foreign investment? Anyone wanting to come up and set up
shop here in New Zealand, they're going to say, hey,
we get too successful, the government will take our stuff
off us. Let's not bother. So just more dumb, crazy
ideas that completely aren't costed. And so they think that
somehow just taxing 6% of the population is going to
(01:48):
pay for all these dreams. You're sadly mistaken. Everyone's going
to get pinged pretty bloody hard.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
Yesterday morning, I watched the Q & A rural debate
with Jack Tame. Good on him. He got all the
six major players there. And if I was to believe
some of the feedback online, Steve Abel crushed it. He
was the winner.
Speaker 3 (02:10):
Okay, well, whatever.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
What a lot of nonsense. When you listen to that debate,
all I can say is God help New Zealand farming
if the left ever get in. Basically, you had the
Greens who are out to lunch, complete mad policies, wanting
to halve production, at least in this country. And then
you've got Labour with no policies. And then you've got
the top party with no idea and the complete naivety
(02:34):
of what they were saying was well demonstrated. And it
was just really, you know, it showed up. We had,
you know, the coalition government actually understands farming and understands
the importance to our economy.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
Now, I could buy that, Andrew Hoggart, if only you
would play nicely with your coalition partners. You're digging away, you...
Mark Patterson, and who was the other one? Of course,
Todd McClay, the Minister of Agriculture and Trade. And you
should have been working together to fight the evil left.
Speaker 3 (03:05):
No, I don't disagree with that. I don't think I
got stuck into them too much. We had a little
joke with Mark on his trip to India. But no,
when I certainly jumped in and supported Todd with what
he was saying around no need to reduce methane to
zero emissions, Look, there may be the odd jab that
goes back and forth, but by and large we've managed
(03:28):
to work with each other pretty successfully over this term,
like I said in the debate. When I started this term,
farmer confidence was at an all-time low. It's actually doing
pretty good now.
Speaker 1 (03:39):
I thought Jo Luxton was the loser in this debate,
and I've been chewing her ear for months and months
and months. For God's sake, come out with some policy.
It's almost too late now.
Speaker 2 (03:52):
I agree, Jamie.
Speaker 3 (03:53):
Basically, their policy is... Sorry, go ahead, Grant.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
No, no, no. Yeah, I agree, Jamie. I mean, agriculture
is such a major part of our economy, and for
Labour not to have any idea what they're going to do.
And ultimately, though, the real people that will determine the
fate of agricultural policy in our country, in Labour, is
not Joe Laxton. It will be Rachel Brookie and the
environmental thing. Having spent the last... All part of this
(04:19):
year with her on the Environment Select Committee, seeing what
she thinks about farming and environmental rules, all I can
say is beware. That's where you've got to look for
where the real farming policy will be.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
Andrew Hoggard, my takeaway from watching the debate was that,
you know, heaven help farming, the primary sector, small business,
whatever in this country, if we have a centre-left government
of Labour, I'm not even counting Te Pāti Māori, the Greens,
who are probably winning by default almost at the moment,
(04:51):
and Opportunity Party. And I thought Daniel Ebb was left
quite a wee bit short when he didn't even get
his numbers right about the cows.
Speaker 3 (05:00):
No, well, just backing up what Grant said, I mean,
it's not even perhaps Rachel Brookings that's going to set
their policy, because if they're in a coalition and they've
got no policies and the Greens have all the policies
on the left, then it'll be the bloody Greens we
end up with. But Yeah, I mean, all I heard
the other morning was, oh, let's tax our way to prosperity.
And somehow we're going to pay more taxes and, you know,
(05:23):
it's only going to be a small percentage of the
population that'll get harmed. We'll just take off them and
give to you and you'll be fine. That sort of
politics never bloody works. It just drives the productive people
away from this country and eventually everyone will have to
bloody pay.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
Now, are you going to come to some agreement with
the Nats, Andrew Hoggart, about net zero in the Paris Agreement?
A ditto if I probably should have Mark Patterson on
as well talking about it, because there seems to be
a bit of a rift developing there.
Speaker 3 (05:55):
Yeah, look, we haven't said we're going to get out
of it straight away, but what we're saying is things
need to change. And the first thing off the cab
there is a split gas NDC. And it makes, as
I said in the debate, it makes absolutely zero sense
that we have this external target of which is net zero,
(06:16):
but then internally we're saying methane doesn't have to reduce
to zero. That's adding more cost to every New Zealander.
So look, we'll come up to some arrangement in the
coalition negotiations, I'm sure.
Speaker 1 (06:28):
Grant McCullum, are the Nats too woke on this? Not
at all.
Speaker 2 (06:32):
We're just very sensible when it comes to wanting to
actually be able to sell our goods overseas, Jamie, and
into Europe and places like that, where they're like, for example,
land getting record prices. Some of these countries need no
excuse to put up barriers just to help add cost
to our products going into these markets. So we just
have to be smart and do our bit to actually
(06:54):
help fight climate change going forward. Because the goal is 2050,
not next year. So I think we have to put
that all in perspective.
Speaker 1 (07:01):
KiwiSaver... Sorry, Andrew, away you go.
Speaker 3 (07:03):
Yeah, I was just going to say, we shouldn't talk
ourselves out of trying to get decent deals for New Zealand.
And I think the key thing we've got to remember
is none of these countries actually asked for all this
woke stuff to be put in the trade agreements. Actually,
it was New Zealand that said, oh, let's put all
this stuff in the trade agreements. So, quite frankly, I
think we need to test this as to whether or
(07:26):
not the rest of the world actually wants it. You know,
European farms are saying split gas is the way to go, so...
I think we've got a bit of support there for
that approach.
Speaker 1 (07:33):
Well, Grant, it's your fault for putting all the woke
stuff into the FTAs.
Speaker 2 (07:38):
I wouldn't call Tom McClay woke. Let me promise you
that Tom McClay is not woke. We're getting on a KiwiSaver, Jamie.
Speaker 1 (07:47):
KiwiSaver for young farmers. This is good.
Speaker 2 (07:50):
Yes, yes. Now, my good colleague, Suze Redmayne from the Rangitiki,
it was her private member's bill, which has actually been
adopted as a government bill, has now been put on
the order paper, which will allow those people who work
on farms and the houses provided... or the Defence Force,
or the police, and the House provided, to actually use
KiwiSaver to buy their first home, and they don't have
(08:12):
to live in it. It can be in town somewhere,
and they can rent it out, so they can get
on the property ladder. There's been a gap in the
whole system for quite some time, and I really applaud
Sue for being so persistent around this. I look forward
to this eventually getting into Parliament and becoming law.
Speaker 1 (08:29):
Hey, just looking at the text machine, and thank you
for some nice messages welcoming me back. Even Andy Thompson
sent one in. Hey, here's one for you, and I
didn't pick up on this one. Jamie, do you realise
Opportunity Party's land tax won't apply to Maori-owned land? Is
that correct?
Speaker 3 (08:47):
I have no idea. I just looked at the point.
They said it was going to reduce land values by 15%
and realised... Well, that's just dumb enough on its own.
That'll pretty much force up interest rates for everyone because
the banks will suddenly have less value to their loan books,
so they'll be viewed as more riskier by the people
(09:09):
that give them money to loan out. So up go
interest rates. Yeah, I didn't know about that one, but
that's equally as dumb.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
Okay. Hey, just to finish on, it was hoardings. weekend
for all you politicians. I don't know why you bother
because you just put your hoarding up beside the other
bloke and you negate each other anyhow. But Grant, I
see you were out there hammer in hand over the
weekend putting up hoardings as a list MP. Excuse me, team.
(09:38):
Almost got through the show without a cough. As a
list MP, Andrew Hoggart, you probably don't even have to
worry about it.
Speaker 3 (09:46):
No, I was actually out there on Saturday, got my
family in the car, getting some child slave labor to
help me put them up all over the man or two.
Did some more on Sunday and actually just came back
from putting one up in the soaking rain and ashes.
this morning. So yep, still getting out there.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
So are your hoardings, Grant, polluting the fine landscape of Northland?
Speaker 2 (10:08):
There's no such, definitely not polluting it. It's informing people
there's an election coming and who the great party of
National they should be voting for. Give their party vote
to National. That's what it's all about, Jamie. So we
have a strong centre-right coalition government led by National. So
that's what the hoardings are there to say. And so
get out there, people. And please, one promise, please, things,
don't vandalise them. They're a damn lot of work to
(10:30):
stick up. And having to keep fixing them all the
time is a real pain.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
Hey, look, because I've been a bit crook, my hearing's
not as good as what it was. Did you say
led by National or led by Winston?
Speaker 2 (10:41):
Led by National.
Speaker 1 (10:43):
Oh, sorry.
Speaker 3 (10:43):
Smart. Well, the latest polls are likely led by David.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
Excuse me. Rightio, lads. Good to catch up. No worries.
A nice, entertaining light way to kick off the first
day back on the tools. Thanks for your time. All
the best, everyone.
Speaker 3 (11:01):
Yes, bye.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
There we go. Today's panel, Andrew Hoggard, Grant McCullum.
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